Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- Part I Medicine and Disease: An Overview
- Part II Changing Concepts of Health and Disease
- Part III Medical Specialties and Disease Prevention
- Part IV Measuring Health
- Part V The History of Human Disease in the World Outside Asia
- V.1 Diseases in the Pre-Roman World
- V.2 Diseases of Western Antiquity
- V.3 Diseases of the Middle Ages
- V.4 Diseases of the Renaissance and Early Modern Europe
- V.5 Diseases and the European Mortality Decline, 1700–1900
- V.6 Diseases of Sub-Saharan Africa to 1860
- V.7 Diseases of Sub-Saharan Africa since 1860
- V.8 Diseases of the Pre-Columbian Americas
- V.9 Diseases of the Americas, 1492-1700
- V.10 Diseases and Mortality in the Americas since 1700
- V.11 Diseases of the Islamic World
- Part VI The History of Human Disease in Asia
- Part VII The Geography of Human Disease
- Part VIII Major Human Diseases Past and Present
- Indexes
- References
V.3 - Diseases of the Middle Ages
from Part V - The History of Human Disease in the World Outside Asia
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2008
- Frontmatter
- Introduction
- Part I Medicine and Disease: An Overview
- Part II Changing Concepts of Health and Disease
- Part III Medical Specialties and Disease Prevention
- Part IV Measuring Health
- Part V The History of Human Disease in the World Outside Asia
- V.1 Diseases in the Pre-Roman World
- V.2 Diseases of Western Antiquity
- V.3 Diseases of the Middle Ages
- V.4 Diseases of the Renaissance and Early Modern Europe
- V.5 Diseases and the European Mortality Decline, 1700–1900
- V.6 Diseases of Sub-Saharan Africa to 1860
- V.7 Diseases of Sub-Saharan Africa since 1860
- V.8 Diseases of the Pre-Columbian Americas
- V.9 Diseases of the Americas, 1492-1700
- V.10 Diseases and Mortality in the Americas since 1700
- V.11 Diseases of the Islamic World
- Part VI The History of Human Disease in Asia
- Part VII The Geography of Human Disease
- Part VIII Major Human Diseases Past and Present
- Indexes
- References
Summary
During the Middle Ages (roughly A.D. 500-1500), Europe changed from an agrarian society composed of relatively small and isolated communities to an increasingly commercial and urban world, though still predominantly agricultural. After centuries of static or declining growth in late antiquity, the population of Europe increased approximately threefold between 800 and 1300. Generally, the history of medieval diseases reflects these demographic and economic facts. While the ancient diseases of pneumonia, tuberculosis, and smallpox, and others including typhoid, diphtheria, cholera, malaria, typhus, anthrax, scarlet fever, measles, epilepsy, trachoma, gonorrehea, and amebiasis persisted throughout our period, many diseases of Europeans during the early Middle Ages were related to deficient diet.
Improved nutrition in the later Middle Ages led to a relatively larger population. As Fernand Braudel (1979) has emphasized, an increase in population alters all aspects of life, bringing advantages but at the same time threatening the existing standard of living and hope of improving that standard. In addition, it can bring disease. Ironically, the improved nutrition that made possible the growth of population, towns, and trade in the Middle Ages in turn created fertile opportunities for the contagious diseases that ultimately changed the face of Europe.
Nutrition and Disease
A revolution in agricultural techniques in northern Europe has been credited with this remarkable population growth (e.g., White, Jr. 1962). Agrarian methods inherited from the Roman Empire were suitable for the warm, dry lands of the Mediterranean and Near East, but proved inadequate on the broad, fertile plains of northern Europe.
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- Information
- The Cambridge World History of Human Disease , pp. 270 - 279Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1993
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